Cherries: Hampshire police wary of derby disorder

13 May 2010 07:00

HAMPSHIRE Police will approach the Cherries-Southampton derby in the same fashion as this year's FA Cup clash between Saints and Pompey.

Eddie Howe's men will visit Saints at some stage during the next campaign after winning promotion to League One.

The two sides haven't played each other in a competitive game since they met in the League Cup in 1987-88, while the last league match between them took place in the old division three in 1959-60.

In that respect, the next meeting will be an unknown quantity for everyone involved. But Hampshire Police have promised they will make sure they are not caught out by any potential violence or other surprises.

The first one will be the test, said Supt Rick Burrows, who oversees policing at St Mary's.

We'll put in appropriate resources based on the current intelligence picture at the time.

But it will be very much the same policing style we did for the Portsmouth game and the relevant number of resources.

It's about targeting those small numbers and we can do that quite easily. It will be a safe football event and we will deal robustly, quickly and efficiently with the small number of people who want to commit that disorder.

Supt Burrows revealed he had been surprised by some comments he had seen online since Cherries secured promotion.

He added: I thought they were both sort of south coast and probably more aligned than South-ampton-Portsmouth, certainly. So I was a bit surprised when I saw some of the intelligence and some of the (Internet) blogs.

But I take those blogs and some of the immediate stuff with a pinch of salt.